


The Game Goes On

by Alerane



Series: An Early Exit [2]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death, Exisal Hangar, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, New Dangan Ronpa V3 Spoilers, Paranoia, Stream of Consciousness, at least a bit, for the sake of disclosure haaa, off screen but it's discussed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-06-03 06:57:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19458754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alerane/pseuds/Alerane
Summary: ‘A body has been discovered!’It rang out through the hangar, Kokichi turning to see the massive screen at the back light up and Monokuma’s grinning face like always there. He knew the robot was being watched by the Exisals, this was a recording but it still played like he was in control-Wait. It played.Kokichi froze. The rest of the announcement continued as usual talking of the time, investigation, and trial. The game hadn’t stopped. Sure he knew it was likely his play wouldn’t be the end, why else was he planning but… they were supposed to come for him. What good would killing each other do, they had a common enemy now he-Kokichi’s eyes widened as he glanced back towards the bathroom door. The coughing had stopped hours ago…The boy shot to his feet, and slipped on one of his papers, landing hard on his knee. He hissed in pain but scrambled back up and hurried towards the bathroom, his scattered thoughts screaming to get out.





	The Game Goes On

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 'Sickness' prompt for Oumota Week on tumblr
> 
> This is a continuation/companion to my previous fic People & Plans, as it continues the same what-if scenario, but this can be read without that as a standalone! If you'd like the context for outside the hangar feel free to check it out.

_The mind is sharp, thoughts like knives,  
The body is weak, carrying our lives._

Kokichi was awake when the morning announcement played. It echoed in the hangar, but nothing else changed. The lights had been on all night, the machines hummed, the pipes steamed. He knew this was true of the whole night, since he hadn’t slept at all. Every little footstep in the hangar echoed, every sound. Every hacking cough.

Despite being closed off in the washroom, every cough reverberated through the entire Exisal hangar. Maybe there was a vent, or an open pipe. There’d be lulls, but it came back, hoarse and awful. It made Kokichi shiver. It died down around 3 hours ago, in the dead of night… or early morning really if the announcements were accurate. At least someone was sleeping in here.

All night Kokichi wrote. He wrote and wrote and wrote. Ideas, plans, concepts. Speeches, edicts. Confessions. He wasn’t even sure what they were for anymore, but he just had to get them down. If he didn’t write, they bounced around in his head, and each new one took more space, and when they were all crammed in there until there was no room to bounce. They were packed tight, squirming, wriggling. Trying to break out. Trying to break him. They hurt his head, and getting them out on paper freed up some place for newer ones to take their place. He should have brought more paper, he laments as the scrawls on each page get smaller and tighter like the spaces in his thoughts.

Stacks of notes were strewn around him where Kokichi lay on his stomach on the floor, propped on his elbows. He tugged at a tuft of hair with his free hand the other wrote away when it happened. 

‘A body has been discovered!’

It rang out through the hangar, Kokichi turning to see the massive screen at the back light up and Monokuma’s grinning face like always there. He knew the robot was being watched by the Exisals, this was a recording but it still played like he was in control-

Wait. It played.

Kokichi froze. The rest of the announcement continued as usual talking of the time, investigation, and trial. The game hadn’t stopped. Sure he knew it was likely his play wouldn’t be the end, why else was he planning but… they were supposed to come for _him_. What good would killing each other do, they had a common enemy now he-

Kokichi’s eyes widened as he glanced back towards the bathroom door. The coughing had stopped hours ago…

The boy shot to his feet, and slipped on one of his papers, landing hard on his knee. He hissed in pain but scrambled back up and hurried towards the bathroom, his scattered thoughts screaming to get out.

Could he have choked? Gone in his sleep? Or was there something dangerous in there Kokichi hadn’t accounted for? Clearly Kaito had been sick for awhile now, not that their sound proof dorms had let this coughing disaster be known until more recently, but if he finally-

His hurried footsteps echoing across the room suddenly slowed to amble as another thought struck, finally surfacing amongst the panic as he neared the door

Three people needed to see a body for the announcement. Sure there was a window in there but how likely was it that all of them were out there peering in at a dead astronaut? The announcement was a recording, they weren’t going to change the rules on when it played now of all times. Could this be a trap for him? If they wanted him to-

A loud banging on the other side of the washroom door jarred Kokichi out of his thoughts and he flinched back.

“HEY WHO’S OUT THERE! LET ME OUT!”

There was another barrage of bangs and the telltale cough.

“GUYS?!”

A pause.

“OUMA?”

Kokichi really wasn’t sure what he expected, but relief hadn’t been top of the list. Cautiously he unlocked the door and swung it open. He was face to face with the Luminary of the Stars again, but despite his fists up and ready, the sway in his stance and the blood stains down his face and shirt were telling. Little bits were even caked in his ridiculous goatee.

“You’re- it’s you, huh.”

In that tense moment between them, Kaito lowered his fists.  
It occurred to Kokichi that Kaito called for the others before him.  
Why had he thought the others were in the hangar?

There’s another wracking cough and Kokichi covers his own mouth, as nausea takes him. Not from the wet bloody sounds, but from a thought. Kaito had assumed the body discovery announcement meant-

“Hey, we need to get out there! Are you listening Ouma?!”

He hadn’t been, but his eyes dart back to Kaito’s at his name. His other hand goes to his pocket. The remote is still there. He still has his ace in his sleeve. Sucking in a breath, Kokichi lowered the hand from his face and composed himself, looking down, thinking.

“We aren’t going anywhere.”

Kaito’s face changes from gritted teeth to disbelief.

“Wh- you heard the announcement! One of our friends is dead, _your_ stupid killing game is still going on despite-” He waves his hands around, “-whatever this was!”

The ‘your’ is dripping with sarcasm. Did Kaito know? But he was right, the game wasn’t over, far from it. All Kokichi knew was that Kaito hadn’t set this trap from here. He couldn’t trust him not to betray him but he probably wasn’t going to kill him. So in here, they were safe, and with the Exisals they could-

“Ouma? Hey I’m talking to you!”

-make demands or barricade the door with-

“What’s going on, do you know something?”

-the equipment in here, and blow up the monokuma he had trapped to force a spare, and from there they would-

A hand came down on his shoulder, and Kokichi near jumped. Kaito had closed the paces between them and was looking him right in the face as his gaze shot back upwards. A new trickle of blood was leaking out of the taller boy’s mouth, unwiped. Unbothered, Kaito shook his shoulder. 

“Hey are you there? Do you know something?”

Kokichi stared at him, wide eyes empty, head full, heart pounding.

“It’s a trap. We aren’t going anywhere because it’s a trap.”

The shaking stops, but there’s a shudder still running through the hand. Something from the illness, quivering under the skin, like a held in cough. Kaito grunts and shifts his weight a bit, leaning more than he meant to likely. 

“It might be a trap, yeah, but someone out there’s been- the others need us. We can’t- ah fuck Ouma we can’t just IGNORE IT!”

“Yes we can. The Exisals are here. We aren’t going to be executed for not going to trial. What are they going to do about it? What are _you_ going to do about it if you go? It’s a trap, and you are not going to walk me right into it!”

“Look, I know you think that but Shuichi and Makiroll-”

“Believe me, you idiot, this is going to get us killed!”

Killed echoes through the hangar and hangs in the air. But it’s not the word that hangs in either of their heads. 

“Believe you, huh. Like we were all supposed to believe you in that tunnel. Well, Mister “Mastermind” you sure don’t sound like one right now. Or are we trying something else today? Are we back to the class clown routine? Well, Ouma? Because I don’t think you killed whoever’s out there, and you know I didn’t.”

Kokichi is hyper aware of the hand still on his shoulder, the weight resting on it, the shudder of another suppressed cough. He slowly pulls the remote from his pocket, eyeing Kaito the whole time, in case this is a ploy to get it from him, but the astronaut doesn’t move, only waits. There’s something… off in his expression. Something that shouldn’t be there, given what Kokichi knows about where he’s been, and what he just said. Why would that feeling be plastered on this would be hero’s face?

What did Kaito have to feel guilty about?

Kokichi hits a few buttons on the remote under Kaito’s scrutiny, takes a small steadying breath before steeling himself for the next bit. He let the grin on his face spread, wide and practiced, the corners of his mouth twitching. Finally he made eye contact again with his sickly hostage, who for the first time in this encounter flinches.

“Do you wanna to try something else today? I think Mister Mastermind is out of his element here and the clown could do with his break, don’t you? Because if we go out there, if it is a trap, Mister Hero, there’s nothing, no back up plan to get us back in here. This is the last chance to hole up and hide. Well?” Kokichi holds out his empty hand, open and extended between them, the offer on the table, the handshake, the trust he wouldn’t give but maybe a promise of mutual benefit. 

The hand on his shoulder lifted, and Kokichi himself swayed as the change just long enough for grip on his fingers to tighten. They shake hands in grim silence. Kokichi’s grin pushes further, his own cheeks straining as he does it. Kaito’s grimace holding the weight of their world. 

“Alright. In a moment two of the Exisals are gonna come in here. We are each getting in one. You can pilot them from the inside, I checked, but if you so much as think about betraying me I will turn yours on auto-pilot, you got that? I don’t know what to expect out there, but it’s probably going to be a trial. A trial someone will want to pin on me. And I don’t like that. So we’re gonna keep them on their toes, and aren’t gonna back down to it. I’m not going down for something I didn’t even lie about doing.”

The hangar door starts to open, a pair of Exisals dutifully following their command. Kokichi turns to walk towards them when he comes up short. His hand is still being gripped. Held. His brows narrow and he looks back at Kaito, hands shaky on the remote. The Exisals are here… if this is the moment he can...he’ll have to…

“Hey. I’ll do whatever you want me to in there as long as it’s getting us, all of us, out of here, alright? No more of this bad guy shit, we’re doing this for real. It ain’t fair to lie to a guy who’s dying, right?”

Kaito cracks a strained grin, more blood dripping. He gives the hand a squeeze. Kokichi freezes again, face falling blank. Face emptying, thoughts racing, piling, filling. A shiver. 

“Well I’m a liar, you know. But all of us? That include you? If you can lie now, you really might be able to play along.”

Kaito rolls his eyes. “Only when it matters.”

He lets go, and starts ambling towards the Exisal. How long has he been limping?  
Kokichi runs to grab his stacks of papers, so much of it stray and lying around. He’s not leaving ANY OF IT to be found, read, scrutinized. There’s coughing through the hangar while he does. Then finally, under a pile of snack wrappers, the three pink bombs, emblazoned with a rat. 

He runs back over to Kaito, just as the boy has managed to hoist himself up to the cock-pit. There’s fresh blood smeared on the Exisal’s knees. Kaito looks down, raising a brow at him. Careful to not drop the mass of paper pressed to his chest, Kokichi hands up two of the pink bombs. Kaito takes them cautiously.

“What are these for?”

“Emergencies. If it comes down to it and we need the trial… need everything to stop, there’s that. I’ve got one, but who knows how long it’ll work for.”

“Why are you giving me two?”

A pause, and a grin, though not the big scary one comes to Kokichi’s face.

“So you hold up the all of us side of the bargain. Can’t go out, can’t throw in the towel until the last play fails, right?”

“What are you now, a coach? I get it.”

The two are silent a moment, and Kaito looks away. He sighs, and there’s something final to it, and Kokichi’s thoughts pile again and won’t stop and he turns and heads for his Exisal, tossing his papers up before him, clambering into the tiny cockpit.

“Alright, we’re doing this.”

“Following you, leader”

The Exisals’ tops hiss shut and they march out of the hangar, looking for answers, looking for an end. Hoping for an escape.

_You’re sick, they say, supportive, concerned.  
You’re sick, they say, as the world burned._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed my play on the prompt, with the two different types of sickness accented in the scene~
> 
> I'd love to hear any feedback you have, and if you'd like me to continue this series for this what-if. I have no idea where it's going but it is fun to write for.


End file.
